[Tormented]
Plot:Set in the tempestuous atmosphere of a suburban grammar school, TORMENTED is a witty and shocking tale of a bullied teenager who comes back from the dead to take his revenge on his tormentors.

Cast:Alex Pettyfer, April Pearson, Larissa Wilson, Mary Nighy, Dimitri Leonidas.

My Thoughts:Pretty frikkin good.

Review:Movies where a bullied teen returns from the grave looking to settle a score with his or ehr tormentors usually worry me. Because this particular subgenre, while it has a decent track record, can end up becoming bogged down really quickly. There's not much you can do differently when someone returns from the dead and seeks revenge. They're either a zombie, a ghost, a demon, or a combination of the sort. And almost always, the person he or she loved ends up being able to distract them just long enough before someone can take the returned angry spirit down, for good.

"Tormented", Jon Wright's pic, does things a bit differently though. It mixes that age old "bullying has consequences" story, with some decent British-styled humor, and some mean, yet tolerable characters. The movie follows a student who's been nicknamed around school as "mullet". He has every trait which would make him an easy target for the "perfect-looking" kids who populate his school. He's fat, has a bad haircut, and hangs out with a much skinner kid who wears glasses. Prime target of course.

The film begins with one of his tormentors giving a speech about how much the student body will miss him. This of course suggesting that Mullet has killed himself in a suicide partaking. Mullet's glasses-sporting friend takes offense to the speech, as he sees it as hypocrisy considering the girl giving it, was Mullet's crush, and at the same time, part of the group that tormented him so much. After the assembly, the girl, and her friends who are high school cliches of the pretty boy, the mean jock/pretty boy's sidekick, the hot bitchy girl, and the token black girl who's mean so she can fit in and run with the crowd, all attend a party later on that night.

They try and pass it off as not celebrating Mullet's demise, but dialogue proves that they sort of are celebrating his death, in a "thank goodness we don't have to expend anymore energy driving that kid to an early grave"..sort of way. At any rate, during the party, they all receive ominous text messages, which signal that Mullet may not be as dead as they at first thought. From there, the movie kicks into gear, but it makes sure to space it's calamities.

And the way the story unfolds is pretty fun to watch. It doesn't shift heavily into the violence, gore, and bloodletting. It eases into those sorts of things as Mullet picks off more and more victims. And as Mullet gets to the really, really mean members of the group, his wrath and revenge through the kills, gets a lot colder and more violent. Which I thought was an interesting little trinket that most people probably would've missed. Mullet really saves his most horrific kills for the evilest members of the bullying entourage.

The film also manages to keep an ominous, moody, and dark tone throughout with some crisp directing, crisp camera angles, and eerie musical scores. But at the same time, it blends this really well with some comedic aspects and characters, such as a small boy who mouths off to the bully entourage a few times, and manages to get a few chuckles out of the viewer. His character however is another intriguing trinket of the movie, because it kind of says that this little kid has more courage to stand up to the bullies that the kids who are twice his age.

At the same time, it's also a sad commentary on leaders and followers. The movie itself speaking of which, also has the "bullying is wrong" undertone, but it's a lot more clever about slipping that into the script. It not only penalizes the bullies in it's story, but it also penalizes the people who stood by and allowed, gently inspired, or ignored the bullying. Whereas in most movies, the chickenshits who were too cowardly or self-involved to stop a student from being tormented, are allowed to survive a film because from a moral standpoint, while they didn't stop it, they didn't fully participate either.

This film pretty much smashes that one golden rule of this subgenre to pieces, and that was a good thing. The kills are pretty cool and work for a film like this. Most of them aren't super nasty, like something you'd see in the latest Jason movie, but they are brutal and violent to a suitable extent for this particular film. Mullet, as a ghost, is also not boxed in by any rules. He can do the usual disappearing act thing, but he can also take punishment whereas most ghosts just have weapons go through them or not harm them at all.

I'd describe Mullet as half undead half ghost. He's certainly not like the ghosts we're used to seeing in our American horror movies where he can do all kinds of stuff in which cgi becomes a necessity. He's more of a stalk and slash kind of ghost, and that gives the movie a cool 80's throwback sort of vibe, ala "Prom Night II" and other 80's ghost/revenge movies. The acting in the film is pretty tolerable, always a good thing, and the characters are a blend of people you love to hate, people you pity, and comedic types.

It all worked pretty well for the most part, proving that diverse characters are always a good thing. The films conclusion has some poetic ties (those who see the movie and pay close attention to the dialogue will know what I mean), and it's also a "right" ending, meaning that in the end, I felt the way things wrapped up was perfect, and had zero flaws. "Tormented" is definitely a movie worth seeing if you like ghost-slasher hybrids.

Positives:A very diverse range of characters, Mullet is a good antagonist, nice kills, great score, awesome directing, perfect ending, and a solid story overall.

Negatives:Nothing major.

Overall:Four stars out of four





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